There is an extraordinary breadth and depth to the ways in which the University—through the work of its students, faculty, alumni, and staff—and New York City affect and reflect one another. Through community partnerships and service programs, employment opportunities and economic impact, basic and applied research, intellectual and cultural contributions, Columbia and New York are woven together into the fabric of academic and urban life.

Columbia is the seventh largest private employer in New York City.

The University focuses on ensuring its own sustainable practices.

Novelist and alumnus Herman Wouk once said Columbia is a place of “doubled magic” where “the best things of the moment were outside the rectangle of Columbia; the best things of all human history and thought were inside the rectangle.”

“New York City is an essential part of our identity,” President Bollinger has written, “It is our extended campus, the field in which our students, faculty, and more than 65,000 alumni work, and our link to the larger world.”

Columbia’s identity has been shaped by being in the City of New York. And much of New York’s history has been shaped by Columbians.